Infuriating computer problem

Tam

Hello H/A

I have a computer problem:

I have a 1gb usb drive and a 8gb sdhc drive that I use to back up and store files. Now when I open up My Computer, both their icons are folders instead of their respective disk icons. This wouldn't really be a problem, but I can't open either drive any more- it just won't let me in.

I tried another usb drive, and that works fine, but I don't have another SD drive to try.

Things I have done recently:

1. Used a cleaner program to clear up Photoshop CS3 files
2. Installed Photoshop CS4

There are precious files on the two malfunctioning drives. Help!

Fletcher

i know you can't open them by double-clicking, but can you get in via right click and "explore"?

sorry, i don't know how computer savvy you are :P

according to googling some people recommend deleting the hidden file "autorun.ini" from the root of the drive if you can get to it

and some found out (after scanning the drive itself) that it was caused by a virus (which when removed fixed the problem)

sadly thats about the extent of my ability to help!

Lezard Valeth

Tam wrote: »

Hello H/A

I have a computer problem:

I have a 1gb usb drive and a 8gb sdhc drive that I use to back up and store files. Now when I open up My Computer, both their icons are folders instead of their respective disk icons. This wouldn't really be a problem, but I can't open either drive any more- it just won't let me in.

Your units are infected with virus. To clean them:
- Get an CD/DVD with LiveCD linux distro (like ubuntu)
- Boot the machine with the linux LiveCD.
- Once the system has booted go to the usb/sdhc drives.
- Delete any .EXE and .INI files in the root directory of both usb/sdhc drives. Also, delete any SYSTEM/HIDDEN FOLDER/FILE . Usb drives don´t have this kind of folders or files. If those folders don´t allow you to delete them, change the folder´s properties to read/write.
- Also, delete any file you don´t recognize.
- Reboot your machine.

darkmayo

When you right click and select properties on the folder what comes up. (Screen shot would be good)

Tam

I'll try that if this ever happens again, but in my frustration, I worked out a slash-and-burn sort of workaround- I formatted both drives and used recovery software to get (most of) the data back.